


all the things i never said

by fallenangelicarus



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: ? - Freeform, Dissociation, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Keith (Voltron) Angst, Keith (Voltron) Needs a Hug, Keith (Voltron) is a Mess, Recovery, References to Depression, Sad Keith (Voltron), Suicidal Thoughts, supportive team
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-05
Updated: 2018-03-05
Packaged: 2019-03-27 09:29:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13878024
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fallenangelicarus/pseuds/fallenangelicarus
Summary: quiet isn't always peaceful.keith can't find the energy to visit the training room, so he lies in bed and thinks.there is an indecipherable pattern on the ceiling, and a phantom pain in his chest.(late night vent work)first chapter with keith suffering alone, and the second chapter with the team supporting him.





	all the things i never said

it's quiet in the castleship, keith notes. it's also cold.

the kind of cold that stays, lingers. it pools in the tips of his fingers and toes, and vibrates lowly in his core.

it could be worse. it could always be worse.

his mind flickers, unfocused. his vision blurs out, and for a second, he imagines he can see the filtered air particles suspended before his eyes. he doesn't have the energy to refocus them.

there's a hollow feeling when he breathes. 

_in, out. in, out._

if he thinks about it, there's a strange gap where the whistling sound of emptiness should be. but there isn't.

the darkened room, lit by the faint glow from the handle of his blade, remains silent save the falsely full sound of air passing through his nose.

 

it's not like he doesn't try.

it occurs to him (seconds? minutes? hours? he neither knows nor cares, to be honest) later that he should get up and train. 

the sheets rustle as his left leg moves a miniscule amount towards the edge of the bed. his head rolls limply to face the wall. his body feels drained, bleached.

he's too tired.

the thought of attempting to move again feels monumental. he doesn't.

the side of his leg is cold too, where bare skin touched the sheets that had previously been unoccupied. it's annoying, but he doesn't see the point in pulling it back. he lets his leg stay there.

 

it's not until his lungs start to ache does he realize that he's been breathing too shallowly  ~~to avoid that empty feeling inside his chest from swallowing him whole.~~ for a brief second, he contemplates not doing anything about it, and just deprive himself of oxygen until his body gives in to exhaustion and he can finally sleep.

sleep was good. when he slept, he didn't feel the dull throbbing of the void threatening to consume him from within, in time with the beating of his heart. he didn't feel the cold branching out inside of him, leeching out the color of his skin. he didn't feel anything.

 

he doesn't feel anything now. but it's the bad kind. the kind that leaves a gaping hole, waiting to be filled. it doesn't scream, doesn't demand. it doesn't have to. it just sits there and waits (a cat on its haunches watching their prey) for him to oblige its needs.

he breathes.

there's a strange taste of regret in the action, woven into the sudden wave of exhaustion that washes over him.

he ignores it, like he ignores everything else.

 

it had been coming on for days. this was just the climax.

he could feel it a few cycles ago, sitting at the table with the rest of the team. the darkness creeping into the edges of his mind, the fatigue. around him, the chatter faded to background noise, and he muttered an excuse nobody heard to leave the table.

he took a nap, and when he woke up, dinner was over. 

 

the next morning (or however days should be calculated in a sunless world), he started his early morning training session late. not that anyone noticed. he vaguely wondered if they even knew. he struggled, to slight irritation: the kind you feel when you're trying to grasp a thought that feels just out of reach.

he had to stand in front of the showers for a while before he could gather the energy to get in.

 

the next time he woke up, he opted to skip out of the session altogether after a few rounds with level 4, in which he was nearly pulverized by a swinging arm he normally would have noticed. but his vision was being strange, taking longer than usual to focus. he could have sworn his peripheral vision had also narrowed.

he tried to go back to bed, but his feet carried him towards the lounge instead. it was empty. quiet. he didn't like it. he left.  ~~just like everybody else.~~

 

the next time he fell asleep, he had slept for the earth equivalent of 17 hours. he awakened to the sensation of someone's hand on his shoulder, shaking him awake. (he didn't want to think about the fact that it was his first human contact since shiro had disappeared that wasn't in training or combat. he also didn't want to think about the fact that the point of contact was the warmest he'd felt since he could remember.) 

lance was saying something about training, his face darkened by the lighting behind him. his hair created a halo around his head, and keith thought about saying as much. but when he blinked again, lance was gone. sighing, he pushed the blanket off and swung his legs off the edge.

 

maybe that was why he couldn't sleep now.

he didn't really care.

there wasn't really any kind of training schedule they went by, seeing as the threat of imminent death on anybody who fell behind was very much real. they were left mostly to their own devices until allura wanted to attempt another team exercise.

imminent death sounded okay. 

 

back at the garrison, keith had been searching. searching for a sense of purpose to fill the hole in his chest, to satisfy the constant needs of the emptiness. if he tried hard enough, maybe his life would have worth. hours and hours of studying, of late night flying simulations, of standing on the edge of his empty dorm room balcony.

it paid off, he supposed, in the shallow way that humans allow to consume and dictate their tiny world. he was the undisputed first in all his classes and on the roster for the next great space exploration. the most talented pilot of his generation.

he recalled feeling frustrated, a red hot anger that burned inside him. the strongest emotion he had had felt for a long time. it was still not enough. nothing ever felt like enough.

 

shiro disappeared, the catalyst for keith's disappearance.

in the absence, he pursued the nagging pull inside his mind that he had been ignoring in favor of academic achievement.

 

voltron should have been enough. his life had worth now, right? he was one of five defenders of the universe, and he  _mattered._

he supposed that he could die then. 

if his life had no worth, then his death should contribute something.

 

he was no fool. he knew that his worth lay in his combat and piloting skills. without them, he was nothing but a burden to the team. he knew he was losing this edge as he sank deeper into the darkness that stained his thoughts.

it was this thought that fueled him as he guided his ship into the particle barrier at naxzela, before the view of his front window was consumed in a fiery blaze. he pretended he wasn't feeling the bitter sting of disappointment behind his widened eyes as he pulled the nose up to avoid the explosion.

he couldn't even die properly, it seems.

 

he notices a pattern of dots on the metal surface of the ceiling, almost invisible in the darkness. he squints halfheartedly, but his eyes fall closed instead. 

sleep is temporary relief.


End file.
